The Big Five Personality Traits

Personality traits

The Big Five Personality Traits

The theory of the Big Five personality traits claims that we can describe ourselves with five main characteristics: openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Each of us varies in how much of each trait is shown in our personality. Now, in order to understand what each trait really means, let’s look at these five “characters” and how they cope after their boat sinks, leaving them stranded on an island in the middle of the ocean.

Open Odegua…

is excited and interested in exploring this beautiful island. The exotic nature inspires her. Excitedly, she has collected stones, shells, and flowers to decorate the entrance of the bamboo hut that she built for everyone. She feels this is an opportunity to learn so many new things.

Clara is conscientious.

She is not excited, but is concerned about the seriousness of the situation and is glad she saved the survival kit from their ship. As usual, she is prepared and starts the crucial tasks right away. She feels that it is her duty to organize everyone and ensure that they start looking for the things they need for survival – fresh water and food.

Extrovert Emilokan…

is thrilled because they all survived. He feels a strong need to talk and share his happiness. And so, he gathers everyone to celebrate their survival and to tell them about his plan to explore the island together.

Agreeable Alaba…

is kind by nature and, despite being tired and thirsty, his main concern is Nora. He offers her a drink from his coconut. Of course, the others know that he usually agrees to everything and are not shy to ask for his help.

Nora is neurotic…

and easily stressed. She has a total breakdown as she sits down on the beach and cries: how are they ever going to get away from this island? The ocean around them looks endless. Nora never knew nature could look so dark and dangerous, and feels completely lost.

After eight weeks, two ships appear on the horizon. Everyone gets excited. Emilokan has the idea to make a fire and he calls the others to help. Instinctively, Clara immediately starts to work.

Alaba brings more wood. Odegua is holding up her beautifully arranged SOS sign, while Nora screams desperately for help. Little do they know who is sailing on these ships…

2 Ships sailing by

The first ship carries a group of psychologists, who have been traveling the oceans since the 1980s. They are investigating the big five personality traits,  also known as the five-factor or OCEAN model. The captain, Lewis Goldberg who coined the term “big five”, is thrilled when he sees the five friends at the beach, each person matching exactly one trait: open, conscientious, extrovert, agreeable, neurotic. Curiously though,  he decides not to stop the boat. As a scientist, he prefers to watch from afar.

On the other ship are five pirates all possessing the exact opposite traits of our friends. Pirate One is emotionally stable and very relaxed. When she sees the survivors on the beach she says we could help them. Pirate Two immediately gets angry with her. He is not listening to anyone and is not willing to change his plans just to help some strangers on an island. Pirate Three thinks this is a complex situation. He thinks that all possible outcomes need to be considered. He feels the need to be alone and think.

Pirate Four doesn’t care. He’s busy looking for the keys to his treasure chest, which is lost again.

Meanwhile, the captain is not open to any new experiences. He ends all discussions when he says our boat won’t stop.

That’s the end of the story. Yes, it was developing into quite an epic, but sadly, this is it. So, what do you think about the big five? Do you recognize your personality in some of the traits, or do you think this theory is flawed, as we cannot describe an entire personality in five parameters?

 

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